Amorphus coralli gen. nov., sp. nov., a marine bacterium isolated from coral mucus, belonging to the order Rhizobiales.

A bacterial strain, designated RS.Sph.026(T), was isolated from mucus of the coral Fungia granulosa collected from the northern Red Sea (Gulf of Eilat, Israel). The bacterium was found to be Gram-negative, non-motile, halotolerant and heterotrophic. Comparative 16S rRNA gene sequence analyses showed that strain RS.Sph.026(T) belonged to the order Rhizobiales, with the highest levels of 16S RNA gene sequence similarity with Rhodobium orientis (92 %). Strain RS.Sph.026(T) grew optimally at a salinity of 3-4 %, pH 7.5-8 and 25-30 degrees C. The major cellular fatty acids were cis-7-octadecenoic acid (C(18 : 1)omega7small es, Cyrillic; 57.2 %) and C(19 : 0) cyclo omega8small es, Cyrillic (15.5 %). The DNA G+C content of strain RS.Sph.026(T) was 67.1 mol%. On the basis of its phenotypic properties and phylogenetic distinctiveness, strain RS.Sph.026(T) represents a novel genus and species in the order Rhizobiales, for which the name Amorphus coralli gen. nov., sp. nov. is proposed. The type strain is RS.Sph.026(T) (=LMG 24307(T)=DSM 19760(T)).